The shrimp is generally cooked in a shell-peeled off state, but even if the shrimp has been cooked in a shelled state, it is eaten with its shell peeled off. When the shrimp is eaten, it is essential to remove the shell from the shrimp. In peeling-off the shell from the shrimp, the peeling-off is performed manually in such a manner that an abdominal segment side carapace which is an outer shell of each abdominal or ventral segment is peeled off from the abdomen side.
However, the peeling-off of a tail of shrimp is performed by peeling-off six abdominal segment-side carapaces of first to sixth abdominal or ventral segments. In this case, even if adjacent two abdominal segment side carapaces are peeled off at one time in order to the six abdominal segment side carapaces of the first to sixth abdominal segments, the operation for peeling off the abdominal segment side carapaces must be repeated three times. However, in practice, the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment is affixed to a tail segment-side shell which is an outer shell of a tail segment and difficult to peel off. For this reason, only the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment is peeled off separately and hence, one separately peeling-off labor is required. That is, a total of four shell peeling-off operations are required for the shell peeling-off of a tail of shrimp.
Such a shell peeling-off of shrimp is carried out for every tail in a case of shrimp consumed in a large amount. If the number of shell peeling-off runs per tail of shrimp is large, the labor required for the shell peeling-off is increased, and a lot of time is required. For this reason, when the abdominal segment side carapaces are peeled off for a large amount of shrimps, the five abdominal segment side carapaces of the first to fifth abdominal or ventral segments are peeled off by three runs of the peeling-off operation, with the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment left without being peeled off. In this case, however, to peel off the respective abdominal segment side carapaces of the first to fifth abdominal segments, it is common that a time of about 10 seconds is spent even by one skilled in the art for peeling off the respective abdominal segment-side carapaces of the first to fifth abdominal segments. A considerably long time is spent for the shell peeling-off operation for the shrimps consumed in a large amount, which comes into question.
When the shrimp is fried in an oil, outer ones of tail limbs of the tail segment must be removed or cut in order to prevent the bursting of the tail segment, resulting in one more operation, e.g., a time of five seconds required. Even in this case, a total four runs of the operation is required, e.g., a time of about 15 seconds is required for peeling-off a tail of shrimp and hence, a considerably long time is spent for the shell peeling-off operation for shrimps consumed in a large amount. Therefore, it is demanded to achieve the shell peeling-off of the shell at each abdominal segment of a shrimp in a short time.
Moreover, when the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment is left without being peeled off, the sixth abdominal segment portion is in a state with the abdominal segment side carapace affixed thereto, and is difficult to eat. For this reason, it is common that the sixth abdominal segment portion is not used as an edible portion and discarded. Therefore, the edible portion of the shrimp is decreased by about 5 to 10 percent by weight, which is a problem.
To facilitate the peeling-off of each of the abdominal segment side carapaces of the shrimp, it is a conventional practice to make cuts in a back of each of the abdominal segment side carapaces of the shrimp. However, if the cuts are made in the back, they are conspicuous, resulting in a degraded external appearance. In addition, even if the cuts are made in the back, the time required for peeling off each of the abdominal segment side carapaces is little different from that when no cut is made, and the cuts in the back of each abdominal segment side carapace do not effectively act on the peeling-off of each abdominal segment-side carapace. Moreover, in this case, the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment and the outer tail limbs of the tail segment remain left without being peeled off and hence, it is impossible to avoid the decrease in edible portion of the shrimp, which is a problem.
There is also a processed product of shrimp made by peeling off five abdominal segment side carapaces of the first to fifth abdominal segments of the shrimp, so that the shrimp product can be eaten immediately after being cooked. However, this processed shrimp product assumes from a problem that the flavor thereof is lowered, as compared with a shelled shrimp. Moreover, the processed product of shrimp suffers from a problem that even if the abdominal segment side carapace of the sixth abdominal segment remain left, the surface area of the side surface is reduced by 15 to 25 percent, because the abdominal segment-side carapaces of the first to fifth abdominal segments of the shrimp have been peeled off, resulting in an injured external appearance and a reduced commercial value of the shrimp product.
The present invention aims at solving the problems concerning the peeling-off of the abdominal segment side carapaces as the outer shell of the shrimp. Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an edible shrimp product, wherein abdominal segment-side carapaces of first to sixth abdominal or ventral segments of the shrimp product can be completely peeled by one run of a simple operation in a time far short from a time required for peeling-off the abdominal segment-side carapaces in the prior art, e.g., in a time which is one third of the time in the prior art, without injuring of the external appearance, and the first to sixth abdominal segments can be eaten.